Home Row Mods (HRM) activation indicator

[Iorvethe]

HRMs are a neat feature of custom keyboard layouts that allows one to place modifiers (such as Control, Alt, etc.) on the home row. The modifiers are then activated when the key is pressed for longer than a given amount of time (the tapping term), otherwise the character on the key is emitted.

Finding the optimal tapping term varies from person to person. If it’s too long the shortcuts are needlessly long to trigger, if it’s too short modifiers may be inadvertently pressed. Finding the sweet spot is an iterative process in which one tries different tapping terms and types some time with them.

A technique to achieve a very low tapping term is to swiftly tap on the keys, which takes some time to get used to, especially with a layout that favors typing rolls. I am currently trying to learn it and I’ve come to want in Monkeytype to have some kind of indicator when a modifier is being triggered, perhaps something similar to this (which is a great resource to learn about the subjet, by the way). It could also be taken further and have a mode (I guess in the funbox) similar to the master difficulty, but which fails when a modifier is triggered.

Thanks for the fantastic website and for considering this feature!